Alignment Question

[SOP8920@Siena.edu]

Hey People,
    Well the time has come for an alignment. You would think that with 149K
miles on the Q that there should be few questions on my part about it. However,
this will be the first time that I personally (instead of my father) will be
taking care of it. 
    I understand that Alignment is supposed to be performed to specification.
However, I had an experience once with a non-Audi vehicle that made me wonder
greatly about where one should go for this service. I took the car to two
different shops, all having the supposed necessary "computer alignment"
equipment. Neither could get my car to stop pulling to the right, and one guy
told me that it was the car. He said that somebody had probably railed a curb
and bent the car out of wack. This speculation didn't anger me for the car had
previously been in the possession of my older sister, who unfortunately is not
known for her driving skill. The massive dent on the nose of the car bore
testament to this fact.
    Anyway, I was talking it over with some people at work, and they told me to
take it to a specific shop. When I arrived there, I was a bit apprehensive. I
handed him my print-out that the previous shop had given me. He glanced at it,
laughed and told me that most of those monkey-wrench boys probably never even
bothered to calibrate the computer. Using a pit, not a lift, and seemingly the
most ordinary of tools, he aligned the car. Although it didn't track perfect,
it hardly pulled at all!! I paid him a very modest fee and left a happy man.
    Now.. with the 200Q, and in a city that I haven't lived in for long, I'm
left with the question of where to take it and what to ask for. I don't need my
car "set-up" for track use, so factory spec would be fine. Should I take it to
my usual mechanic or find a shop that performs alignments routinely? If not my
usual mechanic, who has performed excellent work in the past, then what should
I look for in a shop? 
                               -Osman Parvez
                                89 200q (149K miles)
                                Siena College
                                Albany NY